Out of the Shadows, Into the Limelight
by God's Demonic Messenger
Summary: Sam's first semester of college isn't going particularly well; an incompetent professor quickly throws her schedule into turmoil, and a series of events lead her and Danny to a place both would rather not be.
1. College Blues

**_Author's Note:_**

 ** _I've taken some creative liberty with the canon with regards to this story. I've assumed that video coverage of the events of Phantom Planet were incomplete, thus failing to reveal Danny Fenton's identity. I've further assumed that the wider world were too preoccupied with Danny Phantom to pay much attention to Danny Fenton or his friends. Given the proven incompetence of adults in this universe, these seemed reasonable concessions. I've also made a few other smaller concessions, but they all have plot relevance so I'll let you figure out what they are._**

 ** _Enjoy._**

 ** _o_**

 ** _o_**

 ** _o_**

"Ms. Manson, is there something funny about Ectoplasmic sociology to you?" Professor D. Mentia, PhD in Ghost Studies, magna cum laude (circa 1974) demanded from his podium, an indignant frown on his face.

In the back tier of the largely empty lecture hall, the girl in a black and purple t-shirt hung around wiry arms, tight black jeans stretched around deceptively muscular legs, and heavy black combat boots laced around feet much smaller than they seemed looked back at the man in front of the projector screen with eyes surrounded by thick black eyeliner.

She tried her best to fight down the smile she'd been wearing seconds earlier and said with earnest dishonesty, "No Professor."

"Please, don't stop snickering on our account," Professor Mentia said scathingly, "I'm sure you think I'm crazy like all the others that mocked me over the years, so please, continue. God forbid I spoil your _fun_."

The rest of the class turned to look at her, almost all of them scowling furiously at her. They ate Professor Mentia's insanity up like it was gospel, and every time she'd tried to correct them after class, they'd ganged up on her, calling her ignorant; _Her_!

Sam held her tongue and looked back down at her notebook, which was filled with doodles she'd drawn over the last few weeks of taking this stupid class.

"As I was saying," the professor said, pointedly turning away from Sam and drawing the class's attention back to him, "Ghosts have a very clearly defined caste system, built around the strong at the top and filtering down to the weakest of the weak at the bottom…"

Sam rolled her eyes, wishing she had remembered to pack her Fenton Phones. They may not filter out ghost-related nonsense as well as they did actual ghostly nonsense, but at least she'd be able to drown the professor out with some soothing heavy metal.

Over the last few weeks, Professor Mentia had spoken a grand total of two facts: "ghosts exist" and "they can pass through walls."

Every single other thing he'd said over the last few weeks had been wrong. Twice a week, Always-Early Tuesdays and Dreaded Thursdays, Sam had walked into this packed lecture hall and listened to a phony professor drone on about a subject he knew absolutely nothing about.

A caste system? Armies of ghosts preparing for a full-scale invasion? Ghost powers run on the _fear of mortals_?

It was abundantly clear to Sam that Professor D. Mentia had no idea what he was talking about, but for whatever reason no one else could tell, and Sam was stuck listening to his delusions week after week. There wasn't a Tuesday or Thursday that went by that she didn't regret coming to a school that didn't have a sensible class-dropping system.

Suffering through another half hour of his idiocy, feeling her brain slowly melting into a gelatinous goo, Sam watched as the clock finally ticked its painfully slow way to the end of the class. Before the professor even had the chance to dismiss them, she'd already slung her bag over her shoulder and stood to head for the door, hoping desperately to have a handful of healthy brain cells to show for her haste. If she could just get through the door, she wouldn't have to deal with Mental Daniel Mentia for a whole weekend.

"Ms. Manson!" Professor Mentia said. "I need to have a word with you!"

Sam bowed her head, unfathomable sorrow engulfing her. She dug deep, scrounging for every last scrap of patience she still had, then whispered a desperate prayer to whatever gods there might be (preferably Goth ones) for the strength to endure.

She turned back to face the podium, and saw her classmates' smug smiles. One of the girls, an insufferably girly woman named Brianna, cackled under her breath, roughly pushing past Sam on her way to the door.

Sam didn't even know a person _could_ cackle under their breath. That took practice.

Doing her best to ignore them, she walked down the stairs on the left side of the lecture hall toward the still scowling professor.

When she'd reached the last step of the stairs, the Professor spoke, "You have been nothing but disrespectful to me since you arrived in this class," Professor Mentia said without so much as a dramatic pause, "You've laughed at my lectures, made snide comments about my research, and repeatedly interrupted with sarcastic questions.

"I've spoken it over with the Dean of the Humanities department, and she agrees," he continued, a self-satisfied smirk spreading on his face, becoming almost feral, "Such behavior demands _punishment_. It's in clear violation of the Student Code of Conduct, and what's more, it's completely disrespectful to _me_ ," voice rising into a shout, his undeniably feral smile crumbling into a demented scowl. Professor Mentia leaned forward, one arm extended, a furiously shaking finger pointing from it, and bellowed, "I am the world's FOREMOST EXPERT on ghosts, and I will not tolerate this any longer!"

Sam leaned back into a vertical position as the professor tried, mostly in vain, to regain some of his composure.

Breathing heavily, he began again, "You will report to the Dean's office on the top floor of the Humanities building at 7pm tomorrow, where we will discuss your punishment. The _Dean_ seems to think you deserve the chance to explain yourself."

His tone made it perfectly clear what he thought.

Sam looked back at the professor's furious face, "Is that all? Because I have a math test to study for."

She watched as the professor's face reddened spectacularly. "Yes, it is," he said through gritted teeth.

So Sam hitched her bag higher on her shoulder, turned around, and, trying extremely hard to radiate infuriating indifference, walked out of the lecture hall.

* * *

Sam sat in the shade of a large oak tree in the middle of the vast park that sat in the center of the school campus. In front of her were several textbooks, a few of them open. On her lap sat a notebook that she scribbled in furiously, occasionally glancing up at one of the textbooks resting on the grass or nervously down at her watch.

The park was an excellent meeting place for her since tall, thick trees and small, sloping mounds provided plenty of places for discreet activities. Sightlines were never more than a hundred feet, and the lush canopies of the many trees prevented people in the tall brick buildings on all sides from looking in.

Most students used these features for romantic purposes, but she'd found an entirely different use for them.

"Hey Sam," Danny Fenton's voice said from her left.

Looking up from her homework, she smiled and said, "Hey Danny. How was English?"

Danny walked slowly over to the oak tree, his white and red shirt growing darker as he stepped into its shade, his black hair losing its sheen.

"Same as last time," he sighed, setting his bulging bag next to Sam and easing down to the thick, soft grass. "And the time before that. Writing essays about my professor's politics is starting to get really annoying."

"I told you not to take her!" Sam repeated. "I _told_ you her online ratings were terrible."

"You were right," Danny sighed. "As usual."

"Of course I was," she replied smugly.

"Well _my_ English professor is great," Sam said. "Last week she assigned an essay where we had to 'describe in detail' something cool that we'd done.

"She even said it was alright if it was fictional, so even if she doesn't believe it, I'm covered."

Danny smiled. "That's almost cheating," he said as he pulled a few books from his bag and set them on the grass.

"No kidding," Sam replied, smiling.

"So which one did you pick?" Danny asked, leaning back against the trunk of the tree.

"I went with the time your mom, Jazz, and I saved Amity Park from Spectra, Ember, and Kitty."

"Ooh, that's a good one," Danny replied. "I'm glad I missed it though. Fishing with Dad and fighting Skulker was probably way more fun that being trapped in a nowhere realm for eleven hours. I heard even Quan had, ahem, problems with the plumbing."

"Ew, why?" Sam shivered. Then she smirked and said, "Still, watching how upset Tucker got about the whole thing _did_ kinda make me wish you'd been there…"

" _Ha ha_." Danny said. "You're hilarious." Pulling his Chemistry textbook closer, he began to flip through pages. Finding the one he was looking for, he pulled out his notebook and pen.

"So how was your ghost class?" Danny asked, wearing a knowing smile.

Sam's smirk fell away in a blink. She sighed heavily, "I'm having a meeting with the Dean tomorrow to discuss my punishment for disrespecting the unrespectable.

"I can't understand how Professor Mentia got a job here. He knows _nothing_ about ghosts. _Nothing_. And now I'm going to be punished for saying so! Why does the establishment have to be so stupid?"

"They're going to punish you? For what, exactly?" Danny asked, concerned.

"Snickering, eye rolling, and a handful of snide comments," she replied. "It's not _fair._ How am I supposed to _not react_ to a professor teaching a subject he knows _nothing_ about?!"

"I don't know, Sam," Danny replied unnecessarily.

As Sam breathing slowed back down, the two of them sat together in silence for several minutes, until a question occurred to Sam and she asked, "By the way, Danny. Did you ever find a good place for Wulf around here?"

"Actually, yeah," Danny replied, looking up. "There's a pretty sweet network of caves at the top of Mt. Grimbore," he said, sticking his thumb over his shoulder in the vague direction of the valley's largest mountain. "No idea how they got there, but it looked like they went all over the inside of the mountain."

"Lucky guy," Sam said jealously. Then another smile spread across her face, "You should totally take me up there one of these days; I'd love to go Ghost Spelunking. Imagine all the cool rock formations we'd find in there! And your green ghost light would look _so creepy._ "

"I have a couple tests on Friday," he replied, "so no new homework from those classes. I should have time over the weekend if you wanna go then." He flashed a hopeful smile, "We could make a date of it."

Sam smiled back. "You know," she said wistfully, "normal couples think dinner and a movie make a pretty sweet date."

"And then there's us," Danny said, grinning.

"And then there's us," Sam agreed, meeting his eye.

Just then, the large bell at the top of the nearby Mains tower rang. Sam sighed, "Dang it. I've got Biology class on the other side of campus."

She quickly gathered up her books and stuffed them into her book bag. She had to rearrange her Portable Fenton Wrist Rays, the Fenton Phones she'd ran back to her dorm to pick up, and her Fenton Thermos to make room for them.

Danny stood with her and the two hugged. "See you later Danny," Sam said, then kissed Danny lightly.

"I can give you a lift, if you want," Danny said, letting go. "That way you don't have to walk all the way there."

"No, I've got time to walk there. No point risking it," she said. "Thanks, though."

Then she turned away and began the long walk to her next class.

* * *

Late the next day, Sam knocked smartly on the Dean's door. The Dean's office nameplate said her name was Karen Vandenberg and that she had a PhD in Sociology. Sam took that as a good sign; Dr. Vandenberg might be less likely to take whatever Professor Mentia said as the complete truth.

"Come in," a woman's voice said from behind the door. Sam opened the door and stepped inside.

On the far wall hung several plaques, some of them awards, others degree certificates. On the left wall was a large open window, and on the right a bookshelf filled with the mismatched spines of dozens of novels, with a handful of textbooks tucked into one corner.

In front of her, a single metal chair sat in front of a sturdy, pale wood desk, atop of which rested several stacks of paper and a computer monitor. And behind that black metal chair, that sturdy, pale wood desk and that clunky computer monitor sat both the Dean and Professor Mentia.

"Please sit down," the Dean said grimly. The knot of anxiety that had settled itself in Sam's stomach for the past day tightened. She moved forward and took a seat.

"Between your professor's statements and those of your classmates, I'm going to forgo asking _if_ you were being disrespectful," the Dean began. "Instead, I'm going to ask you _why_ you were being disrespectful, and why you bothered to take the class in the first place if you had such disdain for the subject."

Sam looked back at her, the knot of anxiety easing slightly and moving up to her chest. "I don't have disdain for the subject," she began.

"Bull hockey," Professor Mentia said.

"I have to agree with the Dr.," Dean said after a moment. "Considering what your class and Dr. Mentia have told me, you interrupt even the most serious discussions with sarcastic comments."

"Because they're _wrong,_ " Sam said. "His facts are _wrong_. His research is _wrong_. He doesn't know _anything_ about ghosts. That's-"

"I studied ghosts for _ten years_ in university!" Professor Mentia shouted. "And ever since, I've been researching them. I've been researching them while the rest of the world LAUGHED at ME! How DARE you tell me that my TWENTY YEARS of research is WRONG."

Sam had leaned away from the professor during this, but, encouragingly, so had the Dean. "Calm down, Daniel!" the Dean said.

They watched as Professor Mentia slowly got himself back under control.

The Dean looked back at Sam. "Beneath Dr. Mentia's… vociferous response is a very valid point. Whether or not you _believe_ you know the subject matter better than him is irrelevant; Dr. Mentia is the premier expert on ghost phenomena in all of academia."

Sam began to realize that she wasn't going to get out of this. Still, she had to try, "Dr. Vandenberg, I am a _very_ close personal friend of Danny Phantom. Yes," she said, as Professor Mentia snorted loudly, " _that_ Danny Phantom. He, our friend Tucker, and I have been fighting ghosts since our freshman year of high school. The three of us mapped out the entire Observable Ghost Zone before our Junior year. We beat back the Ghost King and hundreds of other ghosts. Together, we _saved the planet_.

"There are only three people in the whole world that should be able to call themselves 'premier experts,'" Sam said. "And you're looking at one of them."

A bark of laughter escaped Professor Mentia. "You expect us to believe that?" He laughed again, sounding almost hysterical.

"Ms. Manson," the Dean began, disbelief heavy in her words, "I also find that… story hard to believe.

"What's more, the fact that you would be willing to tell it seems to display a severe lack of intellectual honesty, which only underscores Dr. Mentia's claims," she said.

"If that is your only excuse for your behavior, then between that incredibly tall tale and your classmates' categorical testimony, I am afraid I'm going to have to move forward with the most severe punishment your actions have earned you," she said, leafing through some papers on her desk.

Sam's stomach felt like it was in an ever-tightening vice as the Dean spoke, "I can't say I've ever dealt with a case where this level of punishment has been necessary so early in a school year. Samantha Manson, for repeated, blatant disrespect toward a valued member of the faculty both in and out of class, a two semester suspension seems entirely appro-"

At that moment, a figured burst through the wall of the office, striking the Dean mute. White haired and black clad, a stark-white 'D' on his chest, and eyes that glowed bright green, the figure bobbed next to Sam, a tapering tail of dark, wispy ghost vapor trailing from his waist.

"Excuse me, sorry," Danny Phantom said urgently, putting his hands on Sam's shoulders. Sam didn't think she'd ever been so glad to see him.

"I don't mean to interrupt," Danny paused, looking around theatrically, "whatever this is," he continued, "but I just got word of a very large ghost terrorizing a town about thirty miles from here, and I'm probably going to need some actually _skilled_ backup.

"The local ghost-fighting squads the government set up _still_ can't tell which end of the ghost gun to shoot with," he said, "so I'm going to need to borrow my girlfriend for a few hours."

The Dean and Professor Mentia looked back at Danny, their jaws hanging open wide enough that Sam began to half-heartedly worry for the ligaments keeping them from hitting the surface of the desk.

"Sorry again!" Danny said as he grabbed Sam tightly by the shoulders, turned them intangible, and flew the two of them through the ceiling at 112 miles per hour.

ooooo

Flying invisibly above the campus, Sam asked, grinning widely, "Were you eavesdropping on that?"

"I may have stuck my head in," Danny replied dryly.

"You mean that literally, don't you?" Sam laughed. All the anxiety that had built up over the last day evaporated as they flew higher.

"Of course," Danny replied, laughing himself.

"So is there even really a ghost nearby?"

"Nope," Danny replied smugly. "Doing anything right now?"

"You know, just hangin' out," Sam replied, her shoulders still firmly held by Danny.

"Wanna get some ice cream down at Al's Creamery? They should still be open…"

"Sure," Sam said, smiling broadly. They began to quickly descend toward the darkening, squat buildings of their little college town, the sun setting softly behind the forest-covered mountains.

And all the while Sam couldn't help but think that she may just be the luckiest girl in the world.

ooooo

Back in the Dean's office, The Dean and Professor Mentia stared, shocked, at the spot where Danny and Sam had phased through the ceiling. The silence stretched longer and longer.

The Dean recovered first. Sitting up straighter in her chair, she looked down at the profoundly empty black metal chair, then turned to look at Professor D. Mentia, PhD in Ghost Studies, magna cum laude (1974), and said, "You're fired."


	2. Punishment of the Righteous

"Ms. Manson, please consider the impact you could make," the Dean pleaded.

"Dr. Vandenberg-"

"Please, just call me Karen," the Dean interrupted.

" _Fine,_ " Sam replied, raising her hands over her head, " _Karen._ I'm a freshman Karen; I don't know how to teach! How am I supposed to teach a college course on ghosts without knowing how to teach?"

"It's actually fairly simple," Karen replied, "and the rest of the faculty can help if you have any questions. Please Ms. Manson-"

" _Please,_ just call me _Sam,_ " Sam interjected.

"Alright, Sam," Karen said with a sigh. "As you so adroitly illustrated," Sam snorted, "We are quite devoid of expert knowledge on the subject. And as you personally told me, you are one of three such experts in the whole world.

"This class is becoming increasingly popular, and we need an authority on the subject to teach it."

"Why can't-"

"Mr. Phantom is too recognizable a figure to properly teach a college level class, and your friend Mr. Foley is only halfway through his second term as Mayor of Amity Park. You are our only hope of properly teaching this subject for the foreseeable future."

Sam glowered at the ground. Cursing her big mouth, she tried to think of a way out of the situation. On one hand, she'd been right. Aside from maybe some monks in Asia or shamans in India, she and her friends _were_ the only real experts on ghosts.

Well, maybe Vlad Masters, but last they'd checked, he was floating somewhere around Saturn's furthest moon.

And the government probably wouldn't take too kindly to him showing his face again.

"What if I just told another professor what they need to know?" Sam asked. "Couldn't _they_ teach it?"

"Were it so easy," Karen replied with a sigh, "we could bring up quite a lot of professors' online ratings. The sad, unfortunate fact is that, at some point, professors have to answer questions, and if they have to consult a notebook or phone a friend to do that, they aren't really valuable to anybody."

Feeling the inescapability of the corner she'd talked her way into, Sam took a deep breath, then let it out all in a rush. "Fine," she said, regretting every syllable, "I'll try."

* * *

Sam arrived early the next week, pulling her new laptop past the heavy textbooks in her bag and setting it next to the cables attached to the projector hanging from the ceiling. She booted it up and opened her slides, hoping beyond hope that they would work.

She'd spent the whole weekend trying to write down what she knew, organize it into something that a distant observer might describe as a curriculum.

On a cloudy day.

Through oil-smeared sunglasses.

And she wasn't sure if she'd succeeded.

For several minutes, she double and triple checked her slides for errors, all the while wondering what she was even doing there. The clock on the wall that had ticked so painfully slowly the previous week seemed to run twice as fast as it should, ticking away the time she had left.

Then suddenly, much too suddenly, it was time. The doors unlocked remotely with a harsh _click_ , and Sam scrambled to check her slides _one more time._

As her classmates - her _students_ , she reminded herself, feeling a shiver travel down her spine at the thought - as her _students_ filtered through the doors on either end of the top tier of tables, a questioning murmur grew.

She looked up the inclined lecture hall, curved rows of tables and chairs pointed straight at her, and the class full of people that had just the previous week been mocking her beginning to fill seats and stare down at her.

The anxiety she'd been feeling quickly began to rise toward total panic, and would have arrived there and blown straight through into hysteria if one of the older students, a burly man Sam remembered Brianna calling by the name 'Caleb', hadn't said loudly, "What are you doing? Where's Dr. Mentia?"

The disdainful tone of the comment and the slew of similar ones made by the rest of the class paradoxically served to settle Sam's nerves. "Professor Mentia," she said loudly, drowning out her classmates'- _students'_ comments, "was let go last week. Which you'd know if you'd checked your email.

"Unfortunately, since no one else was qualified to replace him, Dr.—" she quickly closed her mouth, catching herself again; saying things wrong was going to get very old very soon, "I mean, Karen Vandenberg, Dean of Humanities, decided to have me do it."

"Do what?" Brianna asked from her place next to Caleb.

"Replace Professor Mentia," Sam replied.

"WHAT?" Caleb demanded. Half the class followed him this time. All but three of them furiously pulled out their laptops and a cacophony of mouse clicks and keyboard strikes filled the room.

Sam watched as face after face fell, each of them reading to the end of the email Dr. Vandenberg had sent out. Curiously, the three students mixed in with the rest of the class didn't even seem bothered by her new position. In fact, they seemed genuinely supportive, casting disapproving glances at the students nearby.

"You have _got_ to be kidding me," Caleb said, folding down the lid of his laptop.

"I did tell you he didn't know what he was talking about," Sam said matter-of-factly.

"Yeah, and you do?" another boy demanded. "Dr. Mentia had a PhD in this stuff; where's your degree?"

"I don't have one," Sam replied.

"Exactly!" Brianna said. "So how could you possibly know better than him?"

"How's not important right now," Sam snapped. "What _is_ important is the fact that the Dean of the University approved for me to be here."

"C'mon guys," one of the three supportive students interrupted, "You really think the University would sack a doctor and replace him with a freshman if they didn't have a good reason?"

"We'll see about that," Caleb said darkly.

Half the class grumbled and half-heartedly pulled out their notebooks, while the other half packed theirs away completely, stood up, and left the lecture hall, led by Brianna and Caleb.

As the last of the leaving students passed through the doors and Sam heard the loud _clicks_ of the doors closing tightly behind them, she said, "Well. That went better than I thought it would."

For the next hour, Sam tried her best to talk about the Ghost Zone. Stumbling and sputtering, she tripped her way through her lesson plan, answering the occasional question from one of the three students that had moved up to the front row.

The others present occasionally scribbled down what she was saying, but for the most part sat slouched, looking mutinously bored.

When the clock finally ticked its way to the end of the class (Sam swore the thing had it out for her), the class rose, bags slung over their shoulders. Sam rapidly packed her laptop away in her bag, shoving her notebook haphazardly alongside it, and then turned to leave…

And saw her only three interested students standing in front of her.

"Uh," Sam said nervously, "can I help you?"

One was a short, thin, incredibly pale woman wearing a black t-shirt with some sort of ship and the words "Starbuck Thirteen" on it in big, sharp letters. She smiled excitedly up at Sam.

To the woman's left stood a tall, dark skinned man that Sam could only describe as 'sturdy'. He had two small silver earrings shining on either side of his head and a white and pink plaid button down shirt that somehow managed to be long enough to cover his stomach.

Beside him was a thin but smartly dressed Asian boy, slightly taller than Sam and standing completely straight in such a casual way that it took Sam a moment before she noticed how weird it looked.

"Yes," the woman said, her excitement not exclusive to her smile, "I mean, maybe- no, shoot!"

Sam looked back at her, her mind utterly devoid of possible responses.

"We just wanted to thank you," the tall man said, voice rumbling out of his throat like a thundering summer storm.

"For what, my _spectacular_ lecture?" Sam replied sardonically, a self-deprecating smile on her face.

"For saving the world," the quiet, marginally accented voice of the Asian boy said.

That stopped Sam up short. "You know about that?" she asked hesitantly, "How do you know about that?"

"Practically everyone on the internet knows about it," the woman said. Sam could just see two tiny blue boxes swinging erratically from the woman's ears as she shook in barely contained excitement. "Is it true that you're dating _Danny Phantom_? I've been trying to find proof of that for ages! My friend, well not really my friend necessarily but this guy I talk to online doesn't believe it. I keep telling him he'd eat his words one of these days (well, strictly speaking it's kinda hard to eat text on the internet, but the point still stands). Wait till I tell my friends I met-,"

"Hold it!" Sam interrupted, cutting the woman very short. " _My_ friends and I like what little privacy we have right now. You go spilling that to every forum you can find, we're going to lose that."

The tall man looked down at the woman, a quelling frown on his face, and her excited smile slowly evaporated, replaced with the sort of profound disappointment typically reserved for the dissolution of a beloved band.

"How'd you guys find out?" Sam asked the other two.

"I watch the news," the tall man said. "Vaguely remembered seeing a photo of you in the North Pole on one of the local stations. Got talking to these two and it sort of all came together. Makes sense now, you getting this job."

Sam absently massaged her chest, convinced that the man's voice had shaken her lungs loose.

"My father was there with you," the Asian boy said politely, recapturing her attention in an instant, "Matsuzuki Daisuke. I am Matsuzuki Katsuo."

"He was there?" Sam asked, shocked. She tried to remember some of the faces that'd scrambled to build the Intangibility Distributor at the North Pole. It was surprisingly difficult trying to remember them through just three years of accumulated memory. "Wait," she finally said, another Asian man's face bubbling to the forefront, "was he the one coordinating the transfer cable construction?"

Katsuo bowed slightly, "Yes. Our family owns Japan's largest electrical systems contractor. My father speaks very highly of Mr. Foley, and also of you and Mr. Phantom."

"That's... great!" Sam said, completely incapable of thinking of something better to say, "And, uh, sorry I didn't remember your name," she said, "It's just that-"

"There is no need to apologize, Ms. Manson," Katsuo said politely, bowing slightly again, "You had barely met, and you had other concerns at the time. Also, the ones at the top so rarely remember all those below them. Where those at the bottom can much more easily remember the ones above."

Sam blinked at that. "Um, well ok," she replied.

Had she fully understood the significance of Katsuo's statement, she would have replied with somewhat more enthusiasm.

"So, um, what did you guys need? Because I've got a class coming up in a little bit…"

"We just came to introduce ourselves," the woman said brightly.

Sam looked back at her and waited.

And waited.

"Sooo…" Sam said finally, "what's your name?"

The woman jumped in embarrassment, "What do you- Oh! Oh, my gosh, I can't believe I forgot! I mean, I got so caught up with actually getting to talk to you that I-"

"I'm Alex," the shuddering rumble said. Alex looked down at the woman.

"Right," she said, taking a breath. "My name's Katherine, but my friends just call me Kat."

"Well, it was, uh, nice to meet you," Sam said, "I uh, guess I'll see you Thursday. Don't… don't forget to study!"

Walking through the faculty entrance a few seconds later, Sam whispered softly to herself, "That is _so_ weird to say."

* * *

Over the next few weeks, Sam slowly got into the rhythm of lectures. It helped that she was also taking classes from _actual_ professors, and, though some of them definitely weren't supportive of the idea, most had been very helpful in formalizing the curriculum when she'd begged them nicely.

Ghost Zone, Ghosts Primer, Ghost Powers, Ghost Factions / Individuals, Ghost Culture. In that order, two to three lessons each, homework on Thursdays, Midterms at the end of every other section. By this point Sam had repeated it countless times everywhere but in her sleep. And she was working on that very, very hard, thinking strongly of all the hours wasted.

Now it was only a matter of getting the class on board. Brianna, Caleb, and the rest of their group had been politely but very firmly rebuffed when they'd demanded Sam be removed. Even better, when Brianna tried to get her obscenely rich father to step in, he'd stormed into the Dean's office, spent about ten minutes shut in there, then walked out and told his daughter to finish the class she signed up for.

Attendance had been slowly getting better, as more and more of the apathetic students grew more and more interested. Now it was only a matter of convincing the openly hostile ones to pay attention.

"Why is there air in the Ghost Zone?" Caleb asked as she finished explaining about the variable time-differential between the real world and the Ghost Zone, the final topic in the section. Caleb's question was the fifth inane question from him in fifteen minutes, and Sam was beginning to feel considerably sorry for the way she'd treated Professor Mentia.

Ignoring Caleb's interruption with that newfound sympathy firmly in mind, she began passing out the quiz she'd prepared with Danny. "This quiz is just to get an idea of how much you know already about ghosts," she said over Caleb's purposely loud conversation with Brianna, "I don't expect any of you to do well on it."

An angry murmur rippled around the room. Before the murmur could move on to angry outbursts, Sam said loudly, "The quiz is NOT a part of your grade, so just relax! I'm just trying to see how much you already know about ghosts."

Which was less than half the reason. She knew they didn't know much, so she was hoping to use the quiz to prove a point. That's also why she and Danny had stuck a section at the end about friendly and unfriendly ghosts.

Based only on their mugshots, her class were going to have to decide if the ghosts were good guys or bad ones. Skulker, the Box Ghost, the Lunch Lady, Pandora, Frostbite, and Wulf; she'd bet Danny dinner and a movie they'd get an average of five out of six wrong.

Unfortunately, he didn't take the bet.

"Start whenever," Sam said, hooking up her Fenton Grader to her laptop. "You've got fifteen minutes."

The minutes ticked by at relatively the correct pace. Sam congratulated herself on finally wearing the clock down.

Caleb, Brianna, and their lovable clique of compatriots were the first of the students to walk up and put their completed tests on her desk, while the rest of the class trickled in more slowly.

The Inquisitive Trio, as she'd taken to calling them, were some of the last to turn theirs in.

As the last student took their seat and the room began to buzz with conversation, Sam fed the quizzes through the Fenton Grader.

"Alright," Sam said after the laptop had finished processing the last one, speaking loudly to get their attention, "You did okay on the regular stuff; about a D- average."

Pressing a key on her laptop keyboard, a graph appeared to illustrate.

An angry murmur rose up from the students. "However," Sam said loudly, "You _all_ did terrible on the Friend-or-Foe portion."

Another key, another graph, but this one's curve was significantly lower. "Average for that was a little less than thirty percent."

"The point of this quiz was to show you how much of what you think you know is wrong," she continued. "That's what-"

"Hold on," Caleb shouted from his seat. "Are you really trying to tell me that most of us got that part _completely_ wrong?! Bull crap!"

Sam pressed another key on her keyboard. "These are the right answers," Sam said, the mugshots appearing on the screen, "They should-"

"There is no way _Pandora_ is a good guy!" Brianna said, staring up at the projector screen. A slew of other students snorted, scowled, and shouted their agreement. " _Everyone_ knows she's a bad guy!"

"That was the whole point," Sam shouted over the students. "To show you how little you actually know!"

"Says you!" one of Brianna's clique shouted.

"Yeah," another shouted, "And we _still_ don't have any reason to believe you!"

"I don't know what you said to convince the Dean you knew what you were talking about," Caleb shouted over the strengthening noise, "but I know for a fact it was a lie!"

"Maybe she got one of her friendly ghosts to hypnotize the Dean," a student mocked to a chorus of cruel laughter.

Sam narrowed her eyes. "Fine," she said. "You still need proof after the Dean shot you down? Then I'll show you proof." A plan began to form in her head that she couldn't wait to try out, "Obviously none of you are going to listen to anything I say today, so be here _on time_ Thursday."

"Now get out of here," she began packing up her stuff, "I've got a friend to meet up with."

The Inquisitive Trio looked at each other and smiled.


	3. The Proof is in the Poltergeist

Sam had arrived early in order to set up the room properly, missing the end of her English lecture in the process. She shifted away the loose cables that had bothered her for a month, removed the extra table on the lecturer's dais that she usually used to hold the scattered contents of her bag, and had made a point to only bring her laptop that day, setting it somewhat precariously on the lecturer's podium, a thick black video cable trailing off it toward the plug on the wall.

She'd been so busy reconfiguring the classroom that she'd completely forgotten to watch the clock in panic, so when the doors loudly unlocked and the class began to file in, all they saw was a girl in black, looking up at them like a deer in the headlights.

ooooo

Brianna looked back at her with contempt. She'd still not forgiven the brat for manipulating her father. Instead of getting her out of this stupid class, that pudgy little girl had somehow managed to trick him into believing her lies. He'd even threatened to take away her allowance if she kept skipping class!

That sort of skill's supposed to be reserved for girls like _her_! Not some flabby brat!

Her newest find, Caleb, completely agreed with her about their so-called professor, and she'd been considering for a while whether to get him to ask her out partly because of it. The two of them sat down next to each other in their usual spots.

ooooo

Caleb noted with frustration but no surprise that their esteemed professor hadn't brought anything to class. So much for that proof she promised. Two more semesters and he'd have his degree in business administration. Two lousy semesters, and he'd been kicking himself for almost a third of this one for indulging in his curiosity.

He'd known it was a bad idea. He'd learned the hard way (in his freshman Philosophy class) that curiosity only led to hard work and failure (he thought of the F as an opportunity for Personal Advancement), so he'd set himself up on the road to money most traveled, and thus obviously effective.

But how was he supposed to have known some tiny little punk was going to get his professor booted out and then take his place? That didn't _happen._

ooooo

Kat, on the other hand, couldn't be happier. Sure, she'd liked Dr.— _Professor_ Mentia, she reminded herself—well enough, but compared to _the Samantha Manson,_ well, it was no contest. Kat had to have watched the news broadcast from the North Pole a thousand times by this point. She and her friends on the Danny Phantom subforum on 16Chan must have gone over it a hundred times _each_ , looking for any scrap of new information.

Because after that point, Danny and Sam had faded back into the world. Now Kat knew it was a question of privacy (she still struggled to fight back the urge to post about this to her friends), and Danny, Sam, and their friend Tucker had come back out after a while, better than ever even.

Still, she _really wished_ she could share this. It was just _so cool._

ooooo

Alex was still amazed by how unwilling the rest of the class was to look for Professor Manson's image online. Heck, if what Kat said was true, all they'd have to do was search for her name and a dozen forums talking about her would pop up.

He may be a Junior on his way to an engineering degree, but some of them were even older than he was and should _remember_ seeing her on TV.

What more proof did you need at that point?

ooooo

Katsuo sat patiently, waiting for class to begin. He, also, did not need proof of his Professor's expertise. His father, normally calm, reserved, talked quite animatedly about Ms. Manson, Mr. Foley, and Mr. Phantom. Such a calm, confident man, his father, yet brought to intense expression by three teenagers from America.

Of course, Katsuo had asked what made these teens so remarkable. After all, they were the same age as him, and he'd felt somewhat jealous at the time.

He had asked, and his father had answered. "Katsuo, son," he'd said, "those teenagers had fire enough to ignite the world, and steel enough to lead it out of the flames. No man I have met could claim such; not even me."

It had taken several years for Katsuo to truly understand his father's words. It began when he lost his childhood invincibility in a bicycle accident; afterwards, he better understood the dangers these teens, individuals his age, had _chosen_ to accept. He had broken an arm and realized he was mortal. They had volunteered to fight ghosts the size of skyscrapers, no doubt suffering worse injuries, and done so over and over.

And once he had begun to accept the responsibilities of adulthood, he started to see the level of devotion to one's community such actions would take. To fight such things with nothing but skill and handheld weapons was to risk death. And yet they did it, over and over. Katsuo saw that as the height of sacrifice; placing oneself in mortal danger for another. And teenagers his age had shouldered it, of their own free will, over and over.

And once he began to investigate ghosts in earnest, discovered the level of power these creatures truly possessed, he realized a small measure of just how dangerous the teenagers themselves must have been, even then, to take on such creatures and _win_ , over and over _._ To command their respect enough to call on them to save the Earth, and to have earned their fear enough to enforce their obedience.

All by an age when Katsuo's largest concerns were schoolwork and girls. Not insignificant concerns, especially at the time, but much smaller than Professor Manson's had been.

However unassuming his professor was, however emotional or seemingly immature, Katsuo would always remember what his father had said; that this woman had steel in her heart enough to pass through the flames of the world.

ooooo

"Hey Kat," Sam said, sticking her head out from under her lectern, one hand holding a wire, "could you come help me with this?"

Kat practically leapt over her desk to help. Stumbling over the strap of her bag, snickering wafting down from the higher tiers, she reached Sam's side and knelt down.

"How can I help?" she asked.

"I don't _actually_ need help with this," Sam said with a smile. Kat looked back in confusion as Sam reconnected the power cable for the lectern's broken light.

"So then—"

"Do you still have that camcorder you carry around?" Sam asked, still smiling.

Kat's pale face reddened to roughly the shade of a tomato. "I don't-, I mean—"

"Do you have it?" Sam said urgently.

"Ye-yeah," Kat replied.

"Good. In about," Sam looked down at her watch, "five minutes, I want you to use it and record _everything_ that happens. Got it?"

"What's—"

" _No time,"_ Sam replied. "Get back to your seat, quick, I'm already running late."

Kat practically sprinted back to her bag, while Sam stood and turned toward the class. "Sorry about the delay," she said as she glanced down at Kat rapidly setting up her camcorder, "Unfortunately, the proof is running a little late."

"Of _course_ it is," Brianna said.

"Alright, you know what," Caleb shouted, "I'm fed up with your bullcrap, kid! Twice a week you waste our time," he waved his arm over the angrily nodding class, "saying _you know best_. But you're just a freaking kid!

"You tell us to come back today and _on time_ for some frigging evidence that you know what the heck you're talking about, and here we are, and your proof _isn't_!I'm freaking tired of listening to you!" he finished, his voice reverberating around the room.

The rest of the class once again followed Caleb's lead and burst into furious noise. Sam surreptitiously glanced down at her watch every few seconds, and eventually she glanced over at Kat. She saw Kat look away from the clock on the wall and lift her camera; saw Alex staring angrily back at the still-shouting class; and saw Katsuo staring intensely back at her, just before she turned to face the class again.

At the exact moment the clock on the wall hit five minutes past the hour, all but a handful of lights in the room shut off, instantly leaving the room in a dim half-light. A sudden silence (after the expected shouts of alarm) settled briefly over the class.

ooooo

Which was shattered immediately by a massive, faintly glowing beast bursting from the wall into the dim half-light beside the Manson kid. It had _massive_ claws (had to be a foot long each!), a mouth full of long, incredibly sharp teeth, jet black fur, and large glowing green eyes.

It roared, Brianna screamed, and tables and chairs briefly experienced flight as the class scrambled toward the doors on either side, the sound of hysterical fear filling the lecture hall. Caleb pushed the tiny nerds in the class out of the way, fighting past several students to get closer to the nearest door, all the while hearing some terrible sound come from where the Manson kid had been.

Almost too afraid to look, Caleb quickly glanced back and had his suspicion confirmed; the beast had almost enveloped the kid and seemed to be leaning in to rip her head from her shoulders, with its wide-open mouth full of terrifyingly large teeth less than a foot from her.

This sight further fueled his panic, and he viciously shoved his way to the door, yanked it open against the accumulated mass of half a class…

And found it blocked by some sort of glowing green barrier.

He didn't even bother to wonder where it had come from. A feeling of complete hopelessness began to spread through him, the sound of his terrified fellow students almost concealing the continued, _horrible_ noise of the Manson kid and probably her three-person fan club being eaten alive.

Gathering his courage, knowing he'd rather see himself about to be eaten, he looked over the sobbing mass that had once been his classmates and down at the lecturer's dais.

His first thought would later embarrass him: _How is she not dead yet?_

His second thought immediately embarrassed him: _Wait, is she…_

ooooo

…laughing hysterically, one arm wrapped around Wulf's shoulder, the other trying its best to support some of his weight. Sam simply couldn't help it; she laughed harder than she'd ever laughed in her _life_ , her high-pitched voice counterpointing Wulf's deep, barking werewolf laugh-thing. Together, the two laughs morphed into roughly the sound of a dying animal.

Just as she thought she'd finally be able to stop, with the gleeful ache in her stomach growing more and more painful, she looked up and saw Caleb and Brianna and the whole rest of the class's extremely-confused faces, and just couldn't help it.

By the time she managed to fight down her second wave of laughter, both she and Wulf had been reduced to balls of flesh and ghost-flesh lying on the ground, rolling with overpowering amusement and completely unable to stand for several minutes.

Calming down slightly, lying flat on her back, she took several deep, _deep_ breaths, which slowly loosened the pain of her abused stomach. Taking her time, she pulled herself up by the edge of the lectern, wiping tears from her eyes and cheeks.

Wulf was still catching his breath, so she reached down and helped him up. When she turned around, her students had picked themselves up from where they'd fallen and were gathered at either end of the back wall, both doors wide open.

"What…" Caleb's voice shook, probably from adrenaline, Sam thought, "the _hell_ is going on?"

Focusing almost all of her concentration on not laughing again, Sam spared a little of it and, with a smile on her face that she desperately tried to keep from spreading, said, "That, class, was a pop quiz; I was seeing how well you remembered Tuesday's lecture."

Caleb stared back, speechless. Which was convenient for her.

Turning to Wulf she said, "That. Was amazing. High _five_ , buddy!" Massive wolf paw met tiny human hand with a fur-muted clap. "I owe you for this one."

"Nedankinde," he replied, smiling and shaking his head. "Vi estas mia amiko!"

"I know I'm your friend, but I still feel like I owe you," Sam said. "Tell you what; I'll bully Danny into taking me up to visit you. We can go hiking!"

" _Hey!"_ a disembodied voice said from what sounded like a dozen places near the ceiling, just as the disabled lights in the room came back on.

"Deal with it!" Sam shouted, grinning up at the ceiling, eyes squinting slightly in the renewed light.

Kat's jaw dropped. Her camera was still rolling, however, so she pointed it at every point she could so quickly that Sam guessed the only thing she'd see later was thirty solid seconds of blur.

"Prive," Wulf replied, nodding and smiling.

"Okay Wulf, we'll see you soon, then. Maybe this weekend," Sam said, continuing to ignore her students, "Thanks again."

Wulf nodded enthusiastically, then leapt through the nearby wall.

Sam turned back to the class. First, she checked the Inquisitive Trio; they all looked to be more or less OK. Alex looked the most shaken, but he smiled shakily back at her regardless. Kat was obviously fine since she'd been partly in on it.

Katsuo was looking at her funny. It took her a moment to think of a word for it: shrewdly. He looked back at her like he was analyzing her. Sam wasn't sure what to think about that, so she looked at the other tiers…

…And snorted a laugh down. None of them had moved. "Come on guys, get back to your seats. We've still got forty five minutes left."

They all took their seats as if they couldn't think of anything better to do. Sam noted with satisfaction that Brianna and Caleb had moved from their toppled desks in the back row to the still-standing ones on the lower tier.

"Uh, Professor?" one of Caleb's coterie said. Sam tried not to look smug. "What, uh, what was that?"

Sam raised her eyebrow and looked out at the rest of the class. "Has anyone seen that thing before?"

Fifteen or so hands rose, some more firmly than others. She looked back at the almost forty students with their hands down.

"Alright," Sam said, feigning impatience. After all, she wouldn't have done this if she thought they'd remembered. "Everyone raise their hands." She waited a surprising short amount of time before they had. Looking theatrically around the room, she said, "This is how many of you have seen Wulf before. He was number 5 on the Friend or Foe portion of the pre-section quiz on Tuesday."

"So, since that's the last place we stopped, we might as well pick up there," she began, opening her laptop as the whole class pulled out their notebooks.

Forty-four minutes later, her first truly attended lecture over, the class rose to leave, and Sam began to pack up her things. Not unexpectedly, the Inquisitive Trio walked up to her when their bags were packed.

Kat was the first to speak; she sounded almost hurt. "Why didn't you _tell me_ Danny was here!" she demanded.

"Kat, you didn't see him before or after you found out," Sam said. "He's part ghost—if he doesn't want to be seen, he can go completely invisible. The only thing it could have done is make you so excited you'd give the game away, or spend the whole time looking for him instead of filming."

Kat tried to look back defiantly and failed.

" _Fine,_ " Kat finally sighed sadly. "You're right.I would have. But I still would have loved to know.

"Anyway, what did you want the video for?"

"I'm probably going to get in trouble for that," she waved vaguely in the direction Wulf had come from, "so I thought I might need a video record of it," she replied. She reached out her hand for the camcorder, pulled the memory card from it, and started transferring its contents to her laptop.

" _I_ would have liked some warning," Alex said in the meantime.

"You paid attention to the lecture on Tuesday," Sam said. "Warning enough." She smiled, looking up at him, "Besides, it's not often a girl like me gets to scare the crap out of someone like you."

He smiled back, shaking his head.

File transferred, Sam handed Kat her camcorder back. She and Alex turned to head up the stairs, leaving Katsuo behind.

Sam looked at him apprehensively, sure something significant was coming. Remembering his shrewd look from earlier, she braced herself for anything.

Katsuo looked back for a moment. His eyes dropped. Then he bowed low, arms at his side, and said simply, "Steel."

Then he turned to follow Kat and Alex, leaving behind a very confused Sam.

* * *

"You know," Danny said from his spot next to Sam on the roof, "You're sort of part of the Establishment now."

Taking her eyes away from the stars above them, she said, "What?! No I'm not! I'm filling in; that's all. As soon as this semester's over, I'm walking straight into the Dean's office and quitting."

"Won't make any difference," he teased.

Sam huffed, pointedly looking back at the sky, "Yeah it will."

"Nope," Danny said. "You've gone too far; you can't go back now. Using power to make students do what you tell them to. Using grades on assignments and tests to influence their futures. Punishing them for disobeying you by scaring the living daylights out of them.

"Admit it Sam," he fake-mocked, "you're one of _them_ now."

Sam turned to look at Danny, her face horrorstruck, "You're right," she said, "Oh _god no,_ you're _right._ " She buried her face behind her arms.

"My life is over."

"C'mon," Danny said, kindly. "It was going to happen eventually. At least this way you can still say you never _completely_ gave it up."

She looked back at him, actual hope on her face, "What do you mean?"

"Sam, you teach about _ghosts,_ " he said, "When it comes to them, we _are_ the Establishment. So all you have to do is not be like my English professor, then slip out after college and study ghosts or something."

"I wanted to go into horticulture!" Sam cried.

"Study ghost plants," Danny said reasonably.

"What if I don't _want_ to deal with ghosts anymore?" Sam asked.

"Then you wouldn't remember to pack the thermos and wrist rays every day," he replied.

She narrowed her eyes. She paused like that, glaring at Danny, then said, "Fine. You're right, I couldn't give up ghosts."

Danny smiled, "Good news for me, then."

She smiled back. Danny leaned over for a kiss, then lay back to continue watching the stars with her on the sloping roof of the Mains building.


	4. When Good Girls Turn Savage

"Alright people, remember: Finals next week," Sam said to the class as she stowed her laptop in her bag. Having realized that most of her professors never used the textbooks they told her to buy, she'd taken to leaving them in her dorm. This made plenty of extra room in her bag, which she primarily used to make her ghost hunting equipment more accessible. "Be ready for anything."

Several students looked at each other, evidently worried. "Uh, Professor," Caleb said first, "What did you say was going to be on the Final, again?"

It had been almost two months since her demonstration, and the class had really come together as a result of it. She'd been put in front of a hearing for it but, after considering all the facts (like how she'd somehow had the clout to bring in a massive, unrestrained werewolf ghost for a tiny demonstration) her punishment for it was waived "in light of Professor Manson's unique expertise, on condition that she refrain from further shocking demonstrations without consulting the board first."

"Well," Sam replied after a moment, "I thought I'd bring in another old friend," she smirked. A nervous rustle swept the room, "I'm kidding!" she said, holding her hands up soothingly, "Jeez, people, relax. Written test, remember? Just the stuff in the slides. I think I remembered to upload them..."

Somewhat panicked, she started to pull out her laptop again when Caleb said quickly, "You did, they're all there."

"Alright, cool, thanks," she said, pushing her laptop back into her bag. The rest of the class was standing, bags over their shoulders, still facing her to see if she had anything else to say. "Anyway, like I said earlier, focus is going to be on the Ghost Zone and Ghost Culture, since I decided to keep the individual ghosts section light, so be sure to stu—"

A deafening claxon went off in the corner, startling everyone. Over the PA system, an automated voice said, loud enough to hear over the continuing claxon:

"ALL STUDENTS, REPORT TO THE NEAREST GHOST SHELTER. A CATEGORY '5' GHOST HAS BEEN SPOTTED WITHIN TWENTY MILES OF CAMPUS. REPEAT: ALL STUDENTS, REPORT TO THE NEAREST GHOST SHELTER. A CATEGORY '5' GHOST HAS BEEN SPOTTED WITHIN TWENTY MILES OF CAMPUS."

Sam was already in motion. Pointing at Katsuo, Alex, and Kat, she shouted over the still-blaring claxon, "YOU THREE! GET THEM," she pointed at the rest of the class, all of whom were looking toward her, "TO THE GHOST SHELTER UNDER THE MAINS BUILDING."

Once all three nodded their understanding, Sam hitched her bag tightly over her shoulder so that it hung down the other side, then sprinted up the steps and out the door.

ooooo

"Wait a minute," Brianna began, only to be nudged toward the opposite door by Kat.

"Hurry _up_!" Kat shouted. Alex and Katsuo were directing the other two thirds of the class into line behind her.

"But did she just leave us here?!" Brianna shrieked, panicked. "Isn't she some sort of amazing ghost hunter or something? Shouldn't she be protecting us?!"

"She is, you idiot," Kat said from in front of her. Leading the way through the hallways and out onto the grounds, Kat continued, "What do you think catching ghosts does for you, protect the polish on your Mercedes?"

Caleb thought this a great idea for a product he could sell.

Other frenzied classes funneled in behind them. All over campus, skittish-looking security guards carrying bulky ghost rifles searched the skies, grounds, and buildings for signs of ghosts, all formed up into loose corridors funneling classes to the nearest ghost shelters.

The Trio's group headed for the large brick Mains building; an old bell tower perched at the top and an angled clay tile roof falling to either side. Kat searched for any glimpse of Professor Manson between the guards. Exasperated, she said, "Where _is_ she?!"

Unexpectedly, she received an answer. Katsuo's grey-clad arm pointed between two guards. "There," he said.

And Kat saw her. Professor Manson was running full speed across the grass, looking up and around her.

Then Kat thought she heard something, a voice shouting something…

ooooo

" _BLUE FOUR,_ " Danny shouted at the top of his lungs, hoping she'd hear him over all the noise of the frightened students.

She did and, just like they'd practiced, she reached her hand up, palm back, and jumped, all in one motion.

At that exact moment, Danny reached out and grabbed her arm, turning them intangible in an instant to save her shoulder.

Breathing heavily she said, "And from behind, into the blue we go!"

"That was Danny _Phantom,"_ an excited whisper said behind Kat. The group, despite Alex's urging at the back, stopped in shock. The whisper went up all around them, from every class, and Kat couldn't help but share in their amazement.

She had been maybe a hundred yards from _Danny Phantom…_

ooooo

Katsuo looked around impatiently. Finally, seeing that Kat had become too distracted, he shouted loudly, " _Kiite Kudosai_!" getting his class's attention. "We have to keep moving!"

Stepping up to the front of the group, he led the class quickly forward, Kat following him while Alex kept the back from falling behind.

Before they knew it, they were being directed frantically past a heavy steel door into a vast, concrete shelter underneath the Mains building. There were vents every few feet on both the ceiling and walls, and dozens of large televisions strung up all along where the walls met the ceiling. Blanketing the ground was a soft, springy, mattress-like carpet.

Next to Katsuo, Kat was looking around in wonder. Then he heard her whisper, "So _this_ is why they hiked up tuition…"

ooooo

"So what are we dealing with?!" Sam shouted over the sound of the wind.

"Not sure," Danny replied from above her, "But Category 5's are huge. You remember that one that showed up in Cleveland?"

Sam shivered. "Oh _yeah,_ I do. Took me a week to get my breath back. So. Much. Running."

As the two passed over the mountains, the sound of honking cars, tearing metal, and crumbling concrete reached their ears.

Then they saw it.

Looking down, mouth hanging open, Danny said, "Did you have any plans for this week?"

Sam replied, awe in her voice, "Breathing, apparently."

ooooo

" _Look at that monster!_ "

" _It's HUGE!"_

" _We are so_ screwed _!"_

"This is Carol Whiting, Action News," the woman on the TVs said, the volume loud enough to be heard over the panicking students. Thankfully, someone had been smart enough to mount speakers in the ceiling, so her voice didn't come from a hundred different places. "We are in the midst of a major ghost attack, and police forces have yet to gain any sort of control over the situation."

The helicopter shot of the ghost shifted to one from a cameraman on the ground. It panned frantically over the chaos, and the sight of a cop in riot gear holding a ghost gun quickly changed into one of said cop getting blown back by a shockwave as a massive ghost foot crashed down nearby.

"Colorado's finest have thus far been unable—" Ms. Whiting put a hand to her ear, "Wait a moment, this is breaking news." She listened intently, a wide smile spreading over her immaculate face. "Yes, it's confirmed! _Danny Phantom_ has arrived to help!"

Again, she put her hand to her ear, "We have just received _live_ footage of his arrival!"

The video cut to a city street, several streetlights flickering and several crushed cars languishing along the sides of the road. A collective gasp went through the room as Danny swept through the dark, Sam hanging from his arms.

"I _told_ you," Kat hissed to Brianna.

The amassed students watched as Danny dropped her to the ground, her feet hitting the asphalt. She rolled to absorb the impact and then rose to stand beside the floating form of Danny Phantom in one smooth motion.

ooooo

Sam and Danny stared up at the ghost. "How do you want to do this?" Sam asked, never taking her eyes off it.

"Well," he began, "I figure we could use the Maddie Miniature Modulator, switch the polarity to amplify, and combine it with my ghostly wail."

"Might weaken it enough to get it into the thermos," Sam agreed, "Good idea." Looking down from the ghost slightly, she pointed, "If you get us to the top of that building, we should have a clear line to it. Maybe avoid causing mass devastation."

"Agreed," Danny nodded, rising up. Sam raised her arms and he grabbed them, lifting them upwards.

" _Isn't she in my biology class?"_

" _She's in my English class!"_

" _She bought coffee from me once!"_

" _I gave her my_ pencil _once!_ "

" _What's she_ doing _there?"_

Katsuo was uncharacteristically excited. He had already seen the steel in her. He'd seen the respect and friendship she'd earned from the Wulf ghost. Seen how she hadn't startled at his roar or shied away from his teeth and claws.

Now, he thought, he was to see her fire. The sort of fire that could make such creatures afraid of its heat. The sort of fire that could make them flee at the sight of it.

The sort of fire that could ignite the world.

ooooo

Kat and Alex watched the nearest screen. Rather, Alex watched, and Kat tried desperately to see over the crowd. Noticing her frantic jumping, Alex reached down, picked her tiny, thin form up, and put her on his back like a child.

After getting over the initial surprise, Kat thanked him, and stared avidly at the screen.

The camera seemed to have lost Danny and Professor Manson, and the anchorwoman was jabbering on about chaos and confusion. Waiting, _hoping,_ Kat watched it anyway.

Then a sound overpowered the anchorwoman, so much so that the anchorwoman covered her ears against it. It sounded like it had nearly burst the microphones, but once they'd gotten control of the volume again, Kat could hear the sound properly.

It was a wail.

ooooo

"TOO MUCH!" Sam shouted, covering her Fenton Phones with her hands, which were evidently overpowered by Danny's amplified Ghostly Wail. Flipping the switch, she deactivated the Maddie Miniature Modulator on her wrist. She still didn't know how he'd managed to stuff it and all the other weapons into his backpack.

Danny stopped, the wail ceased, and he floated down, breathing heavily. "What happened? Where'd it go?"

Sam shook her head, reaching back over her head into Danny's backpack.

ooooo

The students, teachers, and staff in the bunker cheered at the helicopter footage of the ghost bursting into hundreds upon hundreds of pieces. Maybe thousands of them.

Kat, Alex, Katsuo, and the rest of their class, however, looked at each other, worried.

Unlike the rest of the students, they knew that a ghost couldn't be killed; which should have been common knowledge, but they'd all found such things couldn't be relied on in real life.

"The question is…" Caleb said after a moment, loud enough to be heard over the cheering.

"Where did the pieces go?" Katsuo finished grimly.

The bunker's attention was drawn back to the screens as the anchorwoman's cheer was replaced with a shriek of fear.

ooooo

Bob Richmond had studied for two solid years to become a news cameraman. He'd worked tirelessly to perfect the steady run, the running focus, and the perfect visual composition, hoping to one day get a job at a major _domestic_ news outlet.

He wasn't some hardened journalist, going out into a warzone for a story. He'd signed on with Action News to follow car chases, hostage rescue, and fire department calls. Normal, interesting, _safe_ footage.

As dozens of green, flying ghosts swarmed through the streets, picking up anything and anyone they saw, Bob couldn't help but feel that a regular warzone with regular guns sounded pretty sweet at the moment.

His attached reporter had gotten lost somewhere, which in his mind was no real loss (the pompous prick). But he had enough professionalism to keep his camera rolling, feeding a steady stream of footage back to the studio. He didn't know that they were rolling that footage on the air as he hid. He'd lost his headset somewhere in the mad dash to his hiding place.

He just hoped that he survived… whatever the hell this was.

ooooo

"Danny, there's no way we can fight all of these things one by one!" Sam shouted from the middle of a large intersection, tall buildings on all sides and dozens of swooping ghosts limiting her view of Danny above. She shot a ghost back with the rifle in her hand, then reached out and shot another with her wrist ray. "We need to get them all together again!"

"Are you crazy!" Danny shouted back, firing off ghost rays left and right, occasionally using an ice blast to take a few ghosts out of the action for a few seconds. He was distantly aware of the helicopter still hovering above them. "They'll form back up and we'll never be able to get them apart again! That ghostly wail nearly tore down a whole block!"

"Not if we split them up until the last second!" Sam shouted, just before she got knocked back twenty feet into the wall of one of the buildings. Struggling for breath, Sam watched through tearing eyes as the offending ghost moved in for the kill.

She gave it a Fenton Assault Rifle blast straight to the face for its trouble.

Danny looked down at her as she got back up, then shouted, still fighting off a swarm of ghosts, "Divide-and-Conquer? Can we do it with just the two of us?"

"Don't really see any other option!" she shouted. She fired off shot after shot from her wrist rays, letting her Fenton AR hang from its strap at her side. Ghost after ghost fell back, only to be immediately replaced by another, and another, and _another_. "We're going to tire out eventually, and then this place'll be as good as gone regardless!"

"Dang it! If we only had Jazz and Tucker here!" Danny shouted back. Fighting back several more ghosts, he said, "Right! Let's do it!"

Danny curled up, concentrated, and sent out a Repulsion Sphere, blasting the swarm of ghosts away long enough for him to swoop down toward Sam. She was still focused on firing at her own gathering of ghosts, so Danny used one of the code phrases they'd set up for hectic fights.

" _BLUE THREE_ ," he shouted. Sam instantly reached up, her left palm facing to her right, and Danny swooped down and grabbed her, lifting her into the sky.

ooooo

"The fighting continues all over the city as ghosts engage law enforcement in a one-sided battle," Ms. Whiting was saying over the TV. While she spoke, footage rolled of several squads of police ghost-hunters getting knocked out, carried off, or blasted back all over the city.

The bunker had gone quiet again, many people holding their hands over their mouths in horror.

"Meanwhile," Ms. Whiting said as the footage changed to the helicopter cam, "Danny Phantom and his unnamed female companion continue to put up the strongest fight, but even they seem to be struggling against sheer numbers."

Kat worried, Alex watched, and Katsuo observed. Each had their own thoughts as the footage showed Danny and Sam fighting a dozen ghosts each, holding them back but accomplishing little else. Then they saw Danny pause and curl up, the ghosts around him trying to take advantage, only to be forced back by some expanding sphere of ghostly energy.

He then swooped down and grabbed Sam, and the two disappeared, just like they'd done earlier on campus.


	5. Divide Then Conquer

Flying intangibly high above the city, held tightly by Danny beside her, Sam pointed down at a large park in the middle of the city. "There!" She said, "We need to get them to _that_ park!"

Danny looked around at the surrounding city. Thankfully, there seemed to be plenty of big roads leading into the wide park, plenty of big buildings to funnel some of the dumber ghosts through.

"I think you're right," he said after a moment. "If we can get them right there," he pointed at a small rise devoid of trees toward the center of the park, "we should be able to pull it off."

"Ok, let's split up then," Sam said more calmly than she felt. A Divide-and-Conquer maneuver like this one generally needed at least four people. With just the two of them, that meant there were going to be a _lot_ of ghosts for each of them by the time they got to that hill.

"Put me down by that big church over there," she said. "It looks like there's a pretty big grouping I can start with."

"Alright," he said, "and I'll start by the stadium," he pointed at the massive structure on the opposite side of the park. "Clockwise, you think?"

"Yeah," Sam replied. "Well, we'd better get started, before things get _really_ crazy."

Danny flew toward the large steeple close to a mile from the park, just visible over the tops of the buildings, the odd ghost coming in and out of view.

Invisibly, he set her down lightly in an alley a few hundred feet from the church. Sam had been right; the place was swarming with ghosts, but it looked like whatever religious group owned the place had splurged on a ghost shield.

Which made sense.

"Good luck," Danny said. Giving a brief wave, he sped off in the opposite direction. Sam took several deep breaths, ran a mental checklist on the contents of Danny's backpack, lifted her Fenton AR, and fired.

ooooo

"Where are they?" Kat said, sounding well on her way to panic.

Alex pointed at one corner of the nearest screen, "There!"

The helicopter pilot must have seen him too, because he quickly tilted his craft to give his cameraman a better view. Zooming in, the speeding form of Danny Phantom streaked purposefully toward the football stadium in the distance.

But Kat couldn't see Professor Manson at all. "Where is she?! She was with him, where is she?!"

Katsuo spoke from below her, "Keep calm. Mr. Phantom would never leave her if she were hurt. This may simply be a plan of theirs."

"Yeah, there's no way she's hurt," Caleb said. "Not with Phantom there."

Katsuo looked over at him, trying to decide whether to respond. He looked back at the screen, searching for some sign of his teacher. He was glad the anchorwoman had fled into her own bunker; the sounds of his fellow students were distracting enough.

ooooo

Bob had long since stopped sticking his head out of his hole, trying to see if the coast was clear. The rotting boards covering the small, filthy gap between two stairways and an alley had hidden him well, but he could hear screams from further down the street, and they were getting closer.

Every now and then, he stuck his still-running camera through a space between the boards, but it looked like most people had found their own hiding places.

Another scream echoed off the redbrick walls of the surrounding historical apartments, and Bob screwed up his face in fear. "Please god, let me get out of here. I swear, I'll never drink booze in a mosque restroom, I'll never speed through a stop sign in front of an elementary school, and I'll never forget to put the toilet seat down ever again!"

ooooo

Some callous operator in the media bunker had decided to side-by-side Bob's feed with the helicopter's as he said this, his fear coming through perfectly clearly to the students under the Mains building.

Soon, the poor man's whimpering grew quieter for some reason. Kat had been waiting for almost twenty minutes for some sign of Professor Manson. She could see Danny fighting from the helicopter feed, but it wasn't looking for Professor Manson.

She hoped for something, anything that said she was OK. Katsuo said he wasn't worried, but she couldn't see why not, especially now.

This full grown man was crying in terror, relatively safe in his hole, while Professor Manson was who knows where.

Kat was panicking, she knew that, but it seemed like the appropriate time to panic, so she didn't bother to try and calm down.

Hanging off Alex's shoulders, staring intensely at the nearest screen, a terrible sound filtered through the speakers above her. She'd never heard fear like that; spoken so clearly with no words at all. She could feel helpless tears gathering in her eyes at the sound.

ooooo

Katsuo too had begun to worry, regardless of what he had said to his classmate. He knew it was a large city. He knew it had few cameras for them to see with. Still, he worried.

He tried to remember his father's words and take comfort in them.

He'd realized long ago that he did not possess what Ms. Manson, Mr. Phantom, and Mr. Foley possessed, so he tried every day to avoid thinking of them like himself. To remember what they had accomplished…

Yet still he worried. Perhaps because you can never fully understand what you are not.

Several minutes later, only a few of the students and faculty were still staring up at screens that had gone quiet while the Helicopter refueled. Then, a noise filtered down through the speakers, and all looked up, expecting the aerial footage.

But it wasn't. It was the poor cameraman huddled behind his rotting sanctuary. The sound of screaming intensified, and the camera shifted.

Suddenly, he too screamed, static erupting from the speakers at the noise. Then the screen went dark, but before anyone could begin to mourn for the man, it reappeared, several feet above the street and looking down, the man's screams accompanying it.

For several electric seconds, the swaying view of the ground several feet below and the terrified voice of the cameraman above immortalized the cameraman's precarious position hanging helplessly from the arms of a ghost almost a dozen feet above the street.

Then a lance of green light sprouted from the dark street, and the ghost holding the man let go. His dirty, terrified face and the rapidly ascending buildings all the bunker saw as he fell.

When he hit, his hold on the camera slipped and it skittered across the asphalt, the chaotic view from its eye falling still, pointing back at the man. The sound of his crying grew steadily louder as he crawled toward it.

Many journalism students present would take the man's dedication to heart and become some of the best in their field because of it; something the man might have found amusingly tragic considering his panicked early retirement.

The camera captured several more lances of vivid green light striking out from behind him. The gathered school watched through the camera's shaking, disorienting eye as the man lifted it to his shoulder and tried to stand.

Only to collapse again.

A hand reached forward and grabbed his arm. Kat gasped next to Katsuo.

"Get up!" the camera's mic heard Sam say, trying to drag him up, a deep cut still bleeding on her cheek, breathing heavily, the camera lens inches from her face. For a moment, everyone could see the dirt caught in her hair, smudged across her chin and forehead, and mixing with the blood drying on one side of her face.

She looked exhausted.

The room cheered anyway.

"C'mon, man, get up!" Sam shouted urgently, looking over his shoulder. He seemed disinclined to do so.

"I said, GET UP!" She bellowed past the camera. She yanked him up violently, until the camera was much closer to Sam's eye level. "In about _two minutes_ this whole street is going to be packed with ghosts! You need to get _these people_ ," the camera violently panned to face the others Sam must have saved, "into _that building_!" it shifted again toward a sturdy brick building.

"NOW!" her voice commanded from the left.

He moved. Still crying, still carrying his camera, its view shifting back to the people crumpled on the ground, he moved. He helped several of them up, a grimy hand reaching into view to drag some of them to their feet. As the sounds of ghosts grew louder, they rushed into the building, the camera's view bobbing violently, occasionally catching sight of the heels of the other survivors and the approaching dark doorway of the building.

Katsuo heard a voice shouting from the street, but it wasn't until the cameraman had gotten inside, sealed the door, and set himself up next to a window that Katsuo could hear what it said.

"…on you pathetic green slime!" It was Sam. She was taunting the ghosts from the middle of the street. Actually _taunting_ them. A small, deceptively skinny woman standing in the middle of a wide street, empty of everything but smoking cars and broken glass, flickering streetlights failing miserably to banish the encroaching darkness, was _taunting_ the ghosts terrorizing the city.

Her gun was down, her eyes roving, a silver belt glowing green at her waist. There was a scooter on its side several feet behind her, smoke still coming from its exhaust. "You guys couldn't hit the broad side of Pariah's Keep, never mind little old me!" her voice echoed all along the barren asphalt, reverberating between the rows of tall brick buildings.

The room full of people held its collective breath, and in the silence, they heard the cameraman's quavering whisper, "This kid is _freaking_ _ **crazy**_ …"

"There you are!" she said, looking up, "Here I thought you'd chickened out!" Faster than a blink, she raised her gun, and at the same time, the camera shifted.

"Oh my god…" the cameraman's voice said, a reaction shared by most of the room.

For hanging in the air in front of Sam was a vast _wall_ of ghosts. Hundreds, no _thousands_ of them blanketed the sky, blocking the view of the brightening stars above them, the glow of them seeping down into every shadow.

And all of them snarling down at the skinny woman standing alone in an empty street.

Sam fired, Kat hid her face, Katsuo stared, the room gasped, a blinding light flashed.

A moment later, where Sam had once stood, a deep, smoking crater twenty feet across had appeared. The people in the room cried out, but before it could escalate further, the camera's view shifted and they saw Sam through its eye, speeding away on the scooter, still calling taunts behind her, firing blindly over her shoulder from her wrist ray.

Moments later the entire torrent of well over a thousand furiously howling ghosts flooded past the cameraman's window, deafening the students and faculty in the room with the noise; every single one of the ghostly forms chasing after her, each of them gunning _just for_ _her._

Katsuo was unaware that he, too, had held his breath through this. When he realized it, he slowly breathed it out in a single word, spoken in profound awe, his heart still pounding at the memory of that menacing green wall:

" _Fire._ "

ooooo

"Danny, how's it coming?!" Sam shouted into her Fenton Phones over the noise of the wind and the squealing of her tires. "I'm almost at the stadium!"

Constantly swerving to avoid the almost constant stream of ghost blasts hitting the asphalt all around her, Sam could barely think past the next few yards.

 _"Ugh!"_ Came the initial reply. _"I'm—Ugh!—just reaching the church! Start heading toward the park! We should get there about the same time!"_

"Got it!" Sam shouted, leaning hard into a turn that her commandeered moped really wasn't designed to take. Somehow managing to recover from the slipping tires, she gunned it. On her left side, the massive steel and concrete mass of the football stadium towered above her. Under her, the largest north-south road leading to the park sped her forward.

And behind her, more than two _thousand_ polymorphic ghosts followed her, dipping and swerving, shrieking and howling. Two thermoses were going to be _very_ full tonight. Good thing Mr. and Mrs. Fenton had reinforced their design!

Buildings sped past on either side; the ghosts behind her still fired at her near-constantly. Ahead of her the soft, green grass and lush evergreen trees grew rapidly larger and larger.

She leaned further over the handlebars, headed straight through the open gate, and careened over roots and bumps in the grass, all her attention focused on _getting to that hill._

ooooo

The anchorwoman was back. "Our Action News backup helicopter team has taken to the skies to bring you even more comprehensive coverage of the unfolding action," she said.

"And, ladies and gentlemen, what coverage it is," she smiled in what Katsuo assumed she thought was a gracious way, "Two large masses of ghosts are heading toward Central Park, led on either side by Danny Phantom and his unnamed female companion."

Footage of the two massive groups heading like arrows toward each other appeared side-by-side on the screens. And at the tip of each, just out of their reach, were two dark specks barreling closer together.

Katsuo saw the one coming from the stadium stumble, then it separated into two. He could see the distinctive shape of a scooter get swallowed by the ghosts, but Ms. Manson sprinted on.

" _You see that?"_ A tall student in front of Katsuo said to another. " _You see what that looks like?"_

" _You need artillery for that maneuver,"_ the other replied. " _Where's theirs?"_

Katsuo watched the screens as Professor Manson and Mr. Phantom drew together at the top of a small hill. The two huge groups of ghosts surrounded them, as the helicopters struggled to find an angle. Finally, the cameraman of one managed it, then zoomed in as far as he could.

Ms. Manson and Mr. Phantom were standing back to back, arms and weapons raised, each facing what had previously been the other's group.

" _They're done for,"_ one of the two students in front of Katsuo said.

" _I told you,"_ the other replied hopelessly. _"You need artillery to pull that off."_

Katsuo tapped them hesitantly on the shoulder. When they turned toward him, he pointed at the screens and said simply, "Watch."

The two looked back at the screen. The mass of ghosts had begun to swirl around the two on top of the hill, but the cameraman in the helicopter still had an angle. The room watched, breath held, for what they knew was coming.

People gasped all around Katsuo, many looked away, and the anchorwoman droned on hopelessly as Ms. Manson threw down her gun and lowered her arms. Beside her, Mr. Phantom did essentially the same. The swirling, writhing mass of ghosts closed in tight, surrounding the two from all angles.

A howl of triumph forced its way across several miles of city, over the anchorwoman's voice, into the set of mics around her, and finally out through the speakers above the people in the bunker.

Kat cried, Alex shook his head, Caleb put a hand over his face, and the sounds of sobbing began again all throughout the room.

Katsuo spoke, loud enough to be heard by all around him, conviction heavy in his voice, "They _are_ the artillery."

As if to answer his words, a vast dome of green light pushed the writhing ghosts out and away. Then, before the violent green specters had a chance to so much as right themselves, two bright blue shafts of light erupted from the hilltop.

As the thousands of ghosts were sucked against their will toward the source, the cameraman had a clear view of Ms. Manson and Mr. Phantom, standing back to back, confidently directing the shafts of light from a pair of thermoses, making sure they hit every single ghost.

A deafening silence spread, and was quickly shattered as the room cheered louder than ever, many wet cries of happiness mingled throughout. The two students in front of Katsuo looked back at him, jaws hanging open and eyebrows meeting their hairlines. Katsuo nodded at them and said, "See?"

He turned toward Kat and Alex, fighting his way past the celebrating others.

ooooo

Sam and Danny sat down next to each other more quickly than either had intended. " _Ow,_ " Sam said, shifting off her tailbone. Which shifted her _onto_ her throbbing thighs, eliciting another groan.

Next to her, Danny panted, "Let's… Never… Do that… again."

"Sounds good…To me," Sam gasped. The two of them laid back on the grass all but choking for breath, too exhausted to care that the helicopters were hovering over them like a pair of vultures.

After almost ten minutes, the two had regained enough energy to notice the sound of approaching citizens. Sam glanced at Danny and they shared a look.

Danny struggled his way up to a sitting position, then a standing one. He reached down and pulled Sam to her feet.

"Do you have that trip in you?" Sam asked sluggishly.

"Well, it's either I change back with a couple news helicopters above me or I do it in the mountains somewhere instead," he said.

Sam sighed, glancing at the approaching people, "Worth a shot."

Danny carefully picked Sam up, legs in one arm, shoulders in the other, and slowly took off back toward campus.

Almost twenty slow, exhausting minutes later, Danny saw the campus come into view. Looking down, he saw that Sam had fallen deeply asleep, one arm loosely wrapped behind his neck, her breathing slow and steady. So, being a model boyfriend, he drifted silently toward the roof of her dorm as students filed back to theirs from the many "ghost bunkers" around campus.

Phasing down to her room, Danny set her lightly in her bed, covered her with her blanket, turned toward the outer wall… and paused.

Drifting back across her room to her door, he reached through the handle and stuck a quarter behind the latch, locking it closed.

Then he turned back to the wall and drifted off to his own bed in a daze.


	6. Epilogue

It took Sam all of Friday to rest after the events of the previous night. When she finally woke late in the day, it felt like she hadn't moved a muscle in all that time. Apparently, her muscles had decided they quite disliked this neglectful treatment and had staged a minor mutiny.

Every movement a torture, it took her a moment to realize that the terrible pressure near her stomach was not, in fact, her abs shouting at her in protest but rather a much more earthy complaint.

Standing as quickly as her defiant muscles would allow she limped quickly for her door…

And found it locked. Which was odd, because her door didn't _have_ a lock. She twisted hard on the handle, but it wouldn't budge. Shaking the door, nothing happened.

She leaned over carefully, the enormous pressure trying to escape, and looked at the latch. It didn't move at all when she turned the handle.

Then an idea came to her. She hurriedly waddled back over to her nightstand and picked up her phone, dialing a number rapidly.

" _Hello?"_ a voice said tiredly.

"Danny, did you do something to my door?" Sam asked immediately.

"Oh," he replied, slightly more awake. "Yeah, I put a quarter in it. To keep people from waking you up; I thought-"

"Yeah, yeah, very thoughtful, sensitive, considerate," Sam interrupted impatiently. "But there's a problem…"

"I CAN'T GET TO THE BATHROOM!" She shouted, holding her phone in front of her.

"Oh crap!" he said. "I'm so sorry, I didn't think-"

"Stop apologizing and get over here!" Sam interrupted.

"On my way!" Danny said, his voice already sounding slightly distant.

* * *

After they'd both rapidly lost about ten pounds, Danny and Sam left for the cliff in the mountains they'd found the previous month. They both liked to study there when the park was too full or too dark. The unobstructed moon usually cast enough light for them to read by, and when it didn't they brought an old camping lamp Danny's dad had "lost" several months ago.

Because something about using a duplicate of Danny as a lantern had just seemed disrespectful.

On their (conventional) way out of the dorm, they hadn't seen anyone, but they'd heard loud music coming from one of the floors and guessed that somebody was throwing a pre-finals party; a party that had evidently either drawn people out of or driven them further into their dorm rooms.

"What's the name of that literary thing that's like explaining what a car sounds like by comparing it to a thunderstorm?" Danny asked, flipping through his notes.

"Simile," Sam replied, still staring at her biology textbook.

"What about the one where you say one thing and mean another?" He asked, still furiously flipping through his notes.

"Irony," she replied. "Also, sarcasm, but Katsuo tells me we Americans use the two interchangeably when we shouldn't."

"What about the one that's like-"

"Metaphor," Sam replied. She leaned over and looked at his notebook. "Did you even _take_ notes?" she asked. His notebook was full of doodles of ghosts they'd fought and new maneuvers he'd thought up. More than half of the latter had been crossed out.

"A little," Danny said, defensively. "I told you what my professor's like."

Sam sighed. Reaching into her bag, she grabbed her own notebook, "Here. Use mine; I probably won't need it for a bit."

"Also, what was the First Fundamental Theorem of Calculus, again?" he asked, flipping to a different textbook.

Sam threw her notebook at him.

* * *

Sam and Danny spent all of Sunday and Monday trading time between their secluded clifftop study hall, various good but largely unvisited restaurants, and Wulf's cavern complex, where Sam managed to discover several interesting rock formations and sketch out several fungi she'd never seen before.

From their high vantage point, the two also occasionally watched students milling about between the cafeteria, football stadium, library, and the dorms. It made for a nice break from the otherwise relentless studying.

Because of this near constant time away from the main campus, Sam was wholly unprepared for the reactions she got on Tuesday.

* * *

Reaching into her bag to double check she had the tests, cold, early-morning winter air following her into the building, Sam walked through the short hallway leading to the Professor's entrance of her lecture hall.

She opened the door, trying to count the tests one-handed, and immediately flinched toward the back wall as a deafening sound cascaded from the tiers in front of her. " _Son of a—"_ she said as she looked up in confusion.

It was her class, clapping and cheering. Caleb in the back stood, his hands clapping furiously, and the class followed. Brianna next to him looked entirely conflicted about the situation, and would periodically stop clapping and adopt a face that one would expect from someone who had just forgotten their own name, then start clapping again.

Kat and Alex openly cheered, along with almost a dozen others, and even Katsuo was clapping loudly.

Sam looked back, bewildered. Putting her hands up for quiet, she received it almost immediately.

"Anyone wanna tell me," Sam said, somewhat startled by the immediate quiet, "what this is about?"

Interestingly, it was Katsuo who responded. Quite concisely, in fact. "The ghost shelters had televisions with news coverage. Almost everyone in the school watched you and Mr. Phantom catch that ghost."

Sam looked back at him for a long, long second. Finally, she opened her mouth, looked quickly around the room, and said, "Crud."

* * *

As she'd dreaded, _her_ finals were worse. She could barely get _into_ her biology classroom and, once she was finally inside, her class swarmed her. Even the professor was too busy congratulating her in-between asking his own questions to hand out the final.

She'd actually had to _shout_ over them and _demand_ (in the form of a relatively respectful question) that the professor hand out the tests.

She suspected (what with all the glances she got while taking her final) that the rest of her class weren't going to do well on theirs. Sam struggled and spectacularly failed to muster any sympathy for their GPAs.

Her English and math finals were much the same, except there were more proposals to get lunch or coffee or catch a movie.

Sam actually liked those; they made her laugh. The boys (and at least one girl) making the offers didn't tend to see the humor in it.

One (debatably) good thing about the near constant harassing was that it took her mind off the finals themselves. She spent so much time finding shortcuts and planning unseen routes to her classes that it felt like no time at all before she was turning in her history final and speeding out of the classroom for the nearby campus café.

There were tons of people taking pictures of themselves with her in the background, while others tried to get their friends to take their picture with Sam as the main attraction. There were even several intimidated-looking students, some of whom were at least twice as big as her, who diverted around her as she walked.

By the time she arrived at the café where she was supposed to meet Danny, no less than _thirty_ students had stopped her to ask for a photo, or spew some random question about ghosts, or Danny's left hand grip strength or one of the many, _many_ other questions she'd simply stopped letting into her ears.

By the time she'd gotten close to the café, the finals-induced stress that had barely started to lift had been wholly replaced by harassment-fatigue. Her temper was one small match away from going up in flames. Fighting to maintain her indifferent calm, she walked into the busy café.

Her eye twitched as the room immediately became silent.

The long line leading to the counter turned to face her as one. When one of the boys in the back tried to give her his spot in line, the match fell.

"ALRIGHT, THAT'S _ENOUGH!_ " Sam bellowed. "I'm TIRED of getting asked to be in a photo, I'm TIRED of being the background to everyone's selfies, I'm TIRED of getting asked a hundred stupid questions an hour, and I'm _TIRED_ of you guys treating me like I'm some sort of saint!

"All I want," she continued at a slightly lower volume, the many people in the café looking back, stunned, "Is to order my coffee, go sit down outside, and wait for my friend. I _planned_ for the line; I don't _want_ anybody's place. I just want to get my coffee and drink it in _peace._ And _not_ have my every sip recorded and uploaded onto the internet!"

"Do you think you could maybe just give me that much?" she asked, almost pleading, looking around the room for anyone that looked receptive. "Can I just have that much?"

A moment of dead silence greeted this brief tirade. Stunned looks cemented on every face, all of them looking at her, and Sam actually started to worry they might not have gotten the hint.

Then, as one, the whole room nodded dumbly. Sighing in relief, she said, "Thank you."

Sam got in line at the _back_. Those in front of her now seemed to be determinedly not paying attention to her, which was such a vast improvement that Sam didn't bother to stress over the irony of her big, black combat boots, heavy black eyeliner, black and purple t-shirt, and tight black pants suddenly going completely unnoticed.

"Uh, Sam? What's going on?" Danny said as he leaned in for a kiss and sat down. He looked around at the people lined up out the door, turning in their seats to look at them, and the ones hovering near the small iron fence enclosing the café's outdoor patio.

Just then, Sam though she heard Alex and Kat somewhere nearby, but she didn't bother to look for them.

She lowered her head again and, ignoring the people around her, pointed up at a sign hanging from the fence.

"'Paying Customer Seating Only,'" Danny read off. He looked back at the line. "Ok…"

"Apparently the ghost shelters have cable," Sam said miserably. "The whole school saw Danny Phantom and his 'unnamed female companion' beat up that ghost on Thursday."

"Wait," Danny said, looking around at all the people again, "Are you saying…"

"Yeah. Secret's out," Sam said, "Well, mine is."

"Crud," Danny said.

"Yep," Sam replied.

"Professor Manson!" Kat's voice called from outside the fence.

Sam looked toward the noise and saw Kat, Alex, and Katsuo standing next to the fence. "What?" she said.

"You dropped your thermos!" Kat screamed, holding a silver thermos over her head. Sam looked down at her bag and could just see the edge of her Fenton Thermos next to her laptop.

She looked up and said, "That's not—"

Danny was struck with an idea. "Toss it here!" he shouted back. "I just got a call from the police in Greenrock!"

Confused, Kat hesitated. Katsuo took the thermos from her and handed it up to Alex, who tossed it over the iron fence where Danny caught it. The surrounding crowd followed its path through the air.

"What are you doing?" Sam asked.

Danny stood and pulled Sam to her feet. The crowd around them started to buzz excitedly as it watched. "What kind of boyfriend would I be if I made you deal with this," he waved around at the crowd, "on your own?"

"No Danny, don't—" Sam tried to say. But at that instant, Danny stood up straight and changed. A blue ring of light sprang from his chest, and as it split and travelled in either direction, it transformed his appearance from a white shirt and jeans to a black jump suit, a stark white "D" on the front.

"I _knew_ it!" Sam heard Kat squeal. "I _knew_ they were dating! This is _so_ going on the internet!"

"Dang it, Danny!" Sam shouted over the erupting cries of the crowd. "You shouldn't have done that!"

"C'mon, Sam," Danny said, picking her up, legs changing into a wispy tail, "We have a ghost to 'deal' with in the mountains."

* * *

"Well Sam," Karen Vandenberg said. "What will it be?"

The two of them were sitting in Karen's office. Karen had brought in a cushy red-leather chair for Sam, a gesture Sam thought was probably both respectful and pleading. Probably more of the latter.

"Your class enrollment numbers are the highest I've ever seen," Karen continued. "The waitlist alone is several hundred names long. If even a quarter of them are actually interested in the subject, this may be the single-most popular new subject in our university's history."

Sam snorted. "It's not the subject, Karen," she said, her voice mostly flat with just a hint of sadness.

"True," Karen replied. "I think most of them are less interested in the class and more interested in you; and by extension your boyfriend. However, many of them are likely genuinely interested in the subject. It seems a waste—"

"Karen, I get swarmed all over campus," Sam said. "I can't even go to the bathroom without a crowd of girls coming in after me."

"I understand your concern," Karen said frowning. "I've been discussing this subject at length with the Board and the other Deans and we are working on a solution. Such distractions are a detriment to everyone; though of course it's hardest on yourself and Mr. Fenton."

"You think you'll be able to come up with something?" Sam asked, letting a tinge of hope slip into her flat voice.

"Yes, I believe so," Karen replied kindly.

Sam stared down at her hands for several minutes. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Karen watching her patiently. Finally, Sam sighed. " _I'm going to regret this,_ " she whispered to herself.

"Fine," she said louder, "I'll teach the classes next semester. But I want a raise."

Karen laughed and shook her hand.


End file.
